Review of Astro Boy (2009) by John M — 07 Mar 2011

A big surprise. Anybody who talks to me regularly about movies knows that I'm the first to say "don't trust trailers, they lie", but it's hard for them not to influence us as least somewhat on whether or not you want to see the movie.

The trailers for Astro Boy did not catch me at all; they made the movie look kind of crappy, but the good news is that they were not accurate. Now I am not at all familiar with the source material here because I don't do manga, and even though I was expecting lesser quality, I watched this with a completely open mind.

I don't want to give anything away, because some pretty big things happen right off the bat, but in a sentence: it's the origin story of how Astro Boy came to be. I was most surprised at how much I got into this involving story; there's a lot more emotional conflict than I was expecting, making it a lot more powerful than you would imagine.

A couple of side characters are a bit stock, but other than that, this has everything I look for in a kids animated movie: solid animation, a story I could get into and amusing and likable characters that I can connect/emote with and root for.

Astro Boy has a whole lot of heart; it's a shame it didn't perform better at the box office; I completely blame the advertising.